The invention described and claimed herein is an improvement of the non-toxic primer composition described and claimed in our co-pending and allowed patent application Ser. No. 08/301,347 filed by us on Sep. 6, 1994, and entitled "NON-TOXIC PRIMER FOR CENTER-FIRE CARTRIDGES."
As a consequence of the above, the Background of the Invention as set forth in said co-pending application is pertinent to our invention, as described and claimed herein, and therefore is incorporated herein by reference thereto. In addition, the known prior art as described in said Background of the invention is incorporated herein by reference thereto.
In said Background of the Invention, we described in considerable detail the testing program in which we have been engaged. Since filing said application, we have continued that testing program in an effort to further improve such a non-toxic primer. We have now developed an improved non-toxic primer which performs in an improved manner, especially with respect to malfunctioning. We have now developed a new and improved non-toxic primer which has substantially fewer misfires, and yet performs in all other respects substantially equally as well or better than the other known primers.
The need for a non-toxic primer, as described in the above co-pending application, still exists and, if anything, has increased. Our improvement, as described and claimed herein, also is devoid of metallic oxidizing compounds and of hygroscopic compounds, the need for which is outlined quite clearly in our above co-pending application for patent.
The closest prior art of which we have knowledge is U.S. Pat. No. 3,707,411 issued to Gowlick et al; U.S. Pat. No. 5,167,736 issued to Mei et al; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,216,199 issued to Bjerke et al. Additional pertinent patents are identified in the Background of the Invention section of our above co-pending application. None of these patents, to the best of our knowledge, teach the specific percentages of ingredients disclosed and claimed herein, and none of them disclose a truly non-toxic primer which is devoid of both metallic oxidizing compounds and of hygroscopic compounds.